The federal Liberal party may be enjoying a prolonged honeymoon of popular support, but its Ontario counterpart could be in the danger zone.
A new poll from Mainstreet Research and Postmedia paints a "grim" picture for Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne and her governing Liberals. The poll, released Monday, found that 58 per cent of surveyed Ontarians want Wynne to resign.
“With the next Ontario election just a little more than 18 months away, Kathleen Wynne and the Ontario Liberals continue to plumb new depths as they now trail both the Patrick Brown-led PCs and the Andrea Horwath-led NDP," said the polling firm's president Quito Maggi in a release.
The party would come in third place if an election was held today, Mainstreet said.
The poll suggests support for Wynne and the Liberals could take an even harder hit in light of recent charges that were laid against two party staffers.
Good news for Horwath
Pat Sorbara, Wynne's former deputy chief of staff, and party operative Gerry Lougheed were charged with bribery for allegedly offering a would-be candidate a job or appointment to get him to step aside in a 2015 byelection in Sudbury, Ont.
Wynne has not been implicated in the Sudbury case, but the Mainstreet poll found that more than half of respondents believed she may have been involved. The "really, really bad news," according to Maggi, was that 59 per cent of those surveyed said they were following the scandal.
While the poll heralds doom and gloom for Wynne, it holds good news for the leader of the Ontario NDP.
"As Kathleen Wynne’s fortunes fall, left and centre left voters across Ontario are turning to Horwath," Maggi said, noting that the NDP leader's approval rating is at 59 per cent, compared to Brown's 51 per cent and Wynne's 15.
There is a silver lining in the Mainstreet poll for the Ontario Grits, however. The firm said in its report that the party is still strong in seat-rich Toronto, with the Liberals' support coming in at 35 per cent among decided and leaning voters. The PCs and the NDP scored 31 and 27 per cent, respectively.
The poll was conducted with 2,524 respondents on Nov. 2. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 1.95 per cent, 19 times out of 20.
With files from The Canadian Press
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